Ethervane Echo is a full featured ‘keyboard centric’ clipboard extender or manager for Windows. It divides captured clipboard items into different categories based primarily on time captured and type, for example last hour and URLs and it can be tweaked for more advanced use. It does and should work when copying from most any source but it does not support images.
The Win+Insert (can be changed in the Preferences (Tool—>Preferences—>Keyboard)) keys are the default way of bringing up the program and Esc the default way to minimize it back to the tray.
Ethervane Echo’s interface is divided into views, these views can be hidden or others added (View —> Manage Quick Views). The intended features and strengths are to find the items after they have been captured using the keyboard and search (with wild card support). A good example of Ethervane Echo’s ease of use is that when the program is brought up just typing starts a search, there is no need to click in the search box, and if required pressing Esc clears the search box. The search box has basic and advanced modes, the former is search as you type and the latter requires pressing enter to start the search.
The interface tries to give as much information as it can by showing the source, time of capture, size and type of a highlighted item and information on the total number of items in its database. Ethervane Echo has a status indicator – the little green check mark on the bottom of the interface – and it can be paused to not capture clipboard items by double clicking on that same icon.
The basic usage uses the usual Ctrl+C keys for copying and then maximizing the program, choosing a clip using the arrow keys and then pressing Enter to paste the chosen – or even multiple clips – into the active window. Right clicking on each clip presents copy, pasting and editing options as well.
An item can be made sticky to remain in the database forever, this can done via the right click menu, Ctrl+S or the Edit menu.
The Database Maintenance section of the Preferences is important because here one can edit the program’s purging or automatic deleting schedule.
Among other features Ethervane Echo is also capable of holding items in memory instead of on disk for privacy reasons (Preferences—>Database). It supports ignoring clips like those captured within an interval (Preferences—>Capturing Clips) of the last capture, from certain programs (Preferences—>Application Filter), duplicates and passwords. Setting minimum and maximum item lengths are also set in the Capturing Clips section.
See the Keyboard Reference section of the help (or Shift+F1) for all available shortcuts. Ethervane Echo can import items from a text file or a Ditto clipboard database (Tools —> Import Clips). Ethervane Echo has been released as part of DonationCoder’s 2012 N.A.N.Y. (New Apps For The New Year) challenge, requires XP and newer and is available in both portable and installer versions.
